1 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING VINH UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES -    NGUYEN NU NGOC TRAM APPLYING TASK-BASED APPROACH IN TEACHING ENGLISH GRAMMAR TO THE 1ST YEAR-NON ENGLISH MAJORS AT HO CHI MINH UNIVERSITY OF INDUSTRY, NGHE AN BRANCH FIELD: THEORY AND METHODOLOGY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING CODE: 60.14.10 MASTER THESIS IN EDUCATION VINH - 2011 TABLE OF CONTENTS Contents Page Sub cover page………………………………………………………………………… i Statement of Authorship…………………………………………………… ii Acknowledgements………………………………………………………… iii Abstract…………………………………………………………………………… iv Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………………1 List of Abbreviations……………………………………………………………… List of Tables……………………………………………………………………… List of Figures……………………………………………………………………….7 APPENDICES LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AM: Audio-lingual Method EFL: English as a Foreign Language ELT: English Language Teaching ESP: English for Specific Purpose GTM: Grammar Translation Method HUI: Ho Chi Minh University of Industry S: Student SLA: Second Language Acquisition P-P-P: Presentation – Practice – Production T: Teacher TBL: Task-based Language Teaching and Learning (Task-based Learning) LIST OF TABLES Table Page LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale English has been the most popular international language for ages Specially, in the new era of high technology and communication, English is playing a more and more important role and having a strong impact on many fields of the society Moreover, the economic open-door policy pursued by the government of Vietnam has increased a demand for studying English Many people are expected to be competent to communicate verbally with the outside world and to access technology In correspondence to this trend, in almost all of schools, colleges, universities, English is a compulsory subject Ho Chi Minh University of Industry (HUI), Nghe An Branch where I have been working for more than years, is not an exception Together with the growing demand for learning English, there has been an innovation in English teaching and learning methods everywhere in Vietnam For a long time, language teaching in Vietnam was strongly influenced by the structuralist tradition Emphasis was placed on mastery of language structures Students have been taught how to form correct utterances and to understand the structures of the language without any consideration of language use Also, they have been asked to learn every single word by heart, and translate or analyze grammatically every sentence in the text To speak about the teachers, they have often taken up almost all the time in class explaining the form of language to students who were passive recipients This kind of teaching and learning, consequently, has been the “production” of students who were structurally competent but communicatively incompetent However, as the result of psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic research, language teaching has moved from the traditional to a more communicative approach In this current approach, language is considered as a form of social behavior The objective of language teaching is teaching learners to communicate fluently, appropriately and spontaneously in the cultural context of the target language Communicative competence, according to Canale and Swain (1980), is made up of grammatical competence, sociolinguistic competence, discourse competence, and strategic competence With more than years of experience in teaching English at HUI, Nghe An Branch, I find that students have to learn English in two semesters in the curriculum and English is often taught in the first school - year At the end of each semester, the students have to take a written test, not an oral one Therefore, most of the time is spent on grammar points because many of the students have never learnt English before and the teachers have to try to keep to the syllabus, that is, to finish the coursebook entitled “American Headway 2” In addition, many students are too shy to speak in class whereas most of the grammar lessons are carried out in traditional methods In each lesson, the teacher presents new grammar verbally, and then students do, turn by turn, exercises in workbooks Moreover, in teaching practice, there exist some limitations in conducting Presentation – Practice – Production (P-P-P) grammar lessons Touching this pedagogical context, this study emphasizes on the investigation into the application of task-based approach to teaching English grammar at HUI, Nghe An Branch The task-based approach might come as an effective teaching method for the language teachers at HUI A research into the TBL will help the teachers at HUI to interpret and have a thorough understanding of the task-based approach, its theories and characteristics, hence providing an effective application to teaching grammar at HUI pedagogical context All the aforementioned reasons urge the author to carry out the study entitled “Applying Task-based Approach in Teaching English Grammar to the st year-non English majors at Ho Chi Minh University of Industry – Nghe An Branch” Hopefully, the results could serve as a useful source of reference for those who concern about the subject matter 1.2 Aims of the Study With the presented rationale, the specific aims of the study, accordingly, are: a) to examine the reality of applying TBL in teaching English grammar at HUI b) to find out student’s attitudes towards applying TBL in teaching English grammar of teacher at HUI c) to evaluate the effectiveness of the application TBL in teaching English grammar at HUI d) to propose some suggestions and recommendations to promote English grammar teaching in the light of the task-based approach at HUI 1.3 Scope of the Study This research focuses on investigating how HUI language teachers exploit TBL in teaching English grammar in their classes Due to the limitation of time, the author only fulfilled the study among twenty teachers and one hundred the first year students at HUI, Nghe An Branch 1.4 Research Questions In order to serve the aforesaid aims, the research attempts to answer the following questions: What is the reality of the application of the task-based approach in teaching English grammar at HUI? What are the students’ attitudes towards applying the task-based approach to teaching English grammar at HUI? How effective is the task-based approach in teaching English grammar at HUI? What should be done to promote English grammar teaching with the taskbased approach at HUI? 1.5 The Organization of the Study The study includes five chapters as follows: Chapter – Introduction – provides rationale, the aims of the study, the scope of the study, the research questions Chapter – Literature Review and Theoretical Background – present the previous studies related to the thesis and some concepts as theoretical basis for the study Chapter – Research Design and Methodology – describes the research design, instruments for data collection, data collection, data analysis, reliability and validity, and research procedures, which gives details of the research method and describes how the hypothesis of the thesis is interpreted and explained Chapter – Findings and Discussions – presents the results and discussions developed after the linguistics figures are analyzed Chapter – Conclusion and Implications – summarizes the main issues touched upon in the research, the limitations of the research and some suggestions for further studies Following the chapters are the references and appendices CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 2.1 Previous Studies Related to the Thesis In recent years, teachers of all subjects have sought ways to make the classroom more “student-centred” and have investigated the different ways in which students can play more active roles in discovering and processing knowledge The result of the research is the outcome of task-based learning The idea of getting learners to acquire English through tasks was developed in India by Prabhu in the 1980s Prabhu made a strong Communicative Approach Project in Banglore, South India He put forward many kinds of tasks, and designed the learning contents into all kinds of communicative tasks He thinks learners may learn more effectively when their minds are focused on tasks, rather than on the language they are using Harmer found his favour with TBL by saying that, “Many methodologists have concentrated not so much on the nature of language input, but on the learning tasks that students are involved in.” He argued that there seemed to have been an argument that pure rote learning or de-contextualized practice is giving way to language learning that is required as a result of richer experiences in life However, historically reviewed, TBL seems to have gained its currency since the 1996 publication of Willis’s “A Framework for Task-based Learning” (Longman), in which she defined how tasks can be used as the central focus in a supportive methodological framework In this book, she outlined a mode for TBL in which she referred to three stages: the pre-task, the task-cycle, and the language focus Skehan (1998) showed that learner in task-based instructions are given tasks to complete in the classroom and he asserted that transacting tasks in this way will make naturalistic acquisition He explained that the task-based approach is more favourable than any other approaches because it focuses very much on meaning, not on form Jeon and Hahn (2006) addressed their study to the EFL teachers’ perceptions of task-based language teaching in a Korean secondary school context They appreciated the emphasis on learners’ communicative abilities with task-based teaching and learning in terms of designing communicative tasks to promote learners’ actual 10 language use Tseng (2006) indicated the differences between task-based instruction and traditional teacher-led, whole class instruction at two primary school classrooms in terms of four-skill performances of the students Also, the factors that influenced the implementation of TBL at primary school were discussed In Vietnam, there are numerous English M.A theses concerning Vietnamese learning and teaching with TBL Duong Thi Le Thuy (2004) made an investigation into task-based approach, which is used in the field of ESP, for the current English course book for construction engineering Additionally, Vo Phuc Anh Vu (2009) presented the application of task-based language teaching and learning to teaching English speaking skills in upper secondary schools in order to find out how TBL can fit into traditional English speaking classes to promote the students’ communicative competence At Ho Chi Minh University of Industry, Nghe An Branch, the traditional structural method has no longer been the teachers’ favours The teacher-centred method is giving way to a more learner-centred approach This thesis, therefore, focuses on studying the application of TBL in teaching English grammar to probe its feasibility and validity in the setting of HUI, Nghe An Branch 2.2 The Importance of Grammar in Language Teaching and Learning 2.2.1 Definitions of Grammar There have been various ways of defining grammar - a very common and familiar term in language teaching and learning According to Luu Quy Khuong (2006), in the old days, grammar was defined as “the way words are put together to make correct sentences” However, this definition is too simple and people need other ones that can cover aspects of grammar The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (quoted in Harmer, 1987:1) considers grammar as “the study and practice of the rules by which words change their forms and are combined into sentences” There are two concentrated basic elements in this definition: the rules of grammar and the study and practice of ... investigation into the application of task- based approach to teaching English grammar at HUI, Nghe An Branch The task- based approach might come as an effective teaching method for the language... of the task- based approach in teaching English grammar at HUI? What are the students’ attitudes towards applying the task- based approach to teaching English grammar at HUI? How effective is the. .. studying the application of TBL in teaching English grammar to probe its feasibility and validity in the setting of HUI, Nghe An Branch 2.2 The Importance of Grammar in Language Teaching and Learning